Cast Iron Dreams
by Lucere
Summary: AU She casts her hopes in the strongest iron. And denies that, around him, what dreams she shapes fast become brittle as cast iron. AS
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer:** Star Ocean 3 does not belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this.

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Prologue**

Her world crashed when she pried the pod door open, winced at the sudden flare of light, and stared at a sky dull with sunlight and bright with snow.

Instinct prompted her to check her food and water supplies. Both would last her at least five days if she rationed economically. As for clothing, her body was grateful for the extra garments the pods always had on hand. Her tank top and knee-length jeans provided little warmth even inside the pod, where a sensor monitored the temperature and adjusted accordingly. Of course, since the pod's crash, all but the emergency exits were either shut down or destroyed. It was a miracle in itself that she was alive.

Fully opening the pod door, she winced again. Wind and snow whisked in every direction, lashing against her summer-kissed cheeks, her sun-soaked lips. Already her gloved hands were stiff, the beginnings of frost flaking the soft leather. Her eyes watered as she turned her head left and right, praying that a shape would emerge in this vicious, chillingly austere landscape. No features emerged, save the rugged line of mountain rock.

She breathed in deeply, fought the desire to cry. Instead she screamed her best friend's name, screamed it with a pitch uncannily like a banshee in the howling wind:

"Fayt!"

She screamed until her voice lost its pitch, became no more than the moaning of a forgotten apparition. Her fingers, garbed in fading brown, crumbled like sand upon the snow-mounded ground. The tears streaking her face only amplified the cold; but this, this she welcomed, for the heightened sensitivity bordered on numbness. And numbness was a friend entreated often in times of weakness.

For uncharted moments she kneeled in the snow, inhaling, freezing her cheeks with tears. Then the gloved hand swiped harshly at the girl's cheeks, and the cloth-bound feet pressed fully against the ground. In another moment she was standing, adjusting to the soft terrain. Her hands found the staff Fayt had handed her in battle and clutched it. A smile bordering bitterness and optimism found her lips.

"Come on, Sophia. Let's find out where we are."

She did not doubt that she was worlds away from her best friend.

-------

Albel the Wicked, mark this, was not bloodthirsty.

It only so happened that groups of soldiers at a time often attacked his brigade and he was at the forefront, dispatching them with the zeal any arrogant, skilled swordsman would possess. Add to that his orders from the King that, more often than not, required the decimation of entire armies, and the common notion was formed that Albel sought murder as the King sought peace.

Not so. Murder was simply the quickest solution to a deal of life's problems—problems in which man often played the dominant role.

So if inhabitants of Aquaria were to hear of Albel the Wicked encountering a girl collapsed in the snow, her clothes clearly indicating her not of Airyglyph origin, nearly all hands would show for him murdering her in her sleep. The remaining hands would be on him rousing the girl, admiring the way mindless terror would claim her eyes, and then proceeding to piece her dead.

Same for the Airyglyph inhabitants. Only they would say it with nauseous pride, because a ruthless warrior was a revered one.

In truth, in the truth witnessed by no one, rumored by no one, he left her there.

Even men with the epithet 'the Wicked' are not always heartless. In battle, perhaps. The cruel glint of the men's blade, the contortion of the men's lips as an enemy's eyes pleaded mercy, could be nothing but heartless. But, catch them in that moment before the battle, that moment when the swords are sheathed and no enemies crouch before them, eyes glinting as polished steel, and the Wicked men are not so wicked, after all.

It is only their incredible murdering capability that is Wicked. Not the man.

Not the man.

And so Albel, solitary, unwitnessed, dropped a katana near the girl, and left.

---------

Edit: Changed "never bloodthirsty" to "not bloodthirsty." Huge difference there. And "Aquios" to "Aquaria."

(2/19/07)


	2. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** Star Ocean 3 does not belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this.

**AN:** I refrained from explaining anything in the prologue, since, as the word implies, it was an introduction to the story. But now, I want to make clear the setting of the story:

This story is an AU. It starts off like a parallel universe—with Sophia also landing on Elicoor II—but it completely deviates from the game's storyline later on. 4D space will not be mentioned here since it doesn't suit my purpose. I'm going to take some liberties with time since the game's pretty vague about how long the crew stayed on Elicoor. Distances between cities will be tweaked to my satisfaction. And there will be original characters here, though they're all minor.

Well, that's the gist of it. Hope you enjoy reading!

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Chapter 1**

Vox swung his head sharply as the boy—the _captain_ of the Black Brigade—laughed. It was a deliberate, jarring sound; Vox wanted to take a sword to the boy's throat.

Before Vox, Woltar, the boy, and the king of Airyglyph, a katana lay on the conference table.

"Explain yourself, Albel," Vox bit out. "My scouts found this in the snow, beside a collapsed girl. They would have killed her if not for your twisted games."

The boy's eyes were lidded; a smile encompassed his lips. "A little slow on the uptake there, aren't we, Vox? It's been two days since I dropped that."

He ignored the jibe. "The sword is yours," he ground out. "Why did you abandon it to a mere _stranger_? I couldn't think of a more irresponsible thing for a captain to do."

Albel shrugged good-naturedly, took his time in answering. "I had a spare. I figured I would make things easier on your scouts. Your troops, after all, seem to lack a certain skill for…retaining things."

Cold fury possessed Vox as Albel's implications surfaced.

Four days ago, two prisoners and an Aquarian spy escaped from the Airyglyph dungeons. The prisoners' inquisition had been under Vox's charge. His troops had pursued the three escapees and succeeded in capturing their accomplices; however, this morning, even the accomplices' executions had been thwarted because the damned prisoners and woman returned. Airyglyph was left with nothing to show but the corpse of a Black Brigade general and dozens of other incompetent bodies besides.

The humiliation of failure stung, and the boy knew it all too well. Vox's eyes narrowed as he placed the motive behind Albel's laughter and lidded eyes—contempt. The scabbard at his side itched.

"And you couldn't have carried the girl back yourself?" His face was carefully drawn, furious. Albel saw. His smile did not widen, but a subtle crook to his lips gave the impression of a leer.

"In that horrid snow? Certainly not. It was difficult enough returning home on foot. I'm sure it must have been excruciating for your air riders to traverse such terrible conditions, as well."

It had ceased to snow since dawn.

"That's enough, Albel." The king threw Albel a pointed stare; the boy merely shrugged. "We need to decide what to do with the girl."

"Kill her," Vox said instantly, leveling a glare on Albel, daring him to speak out. "Before those Aquarian scum return. My scouts found another one of their weapons not far from the girl."

It was Woltar who spoke. "If memory serves me correct, Vox, it was your inquisitor who made them so susceptible to Aquarian wiles. Perhaps we should attempt a different approach."

"The old man has a point." Vox gripped the edge of the table.

"And what point is that, Albel?" the king inquired.

Albel looked directly at Vox. He seemed to be laughing, though no laughter expelled from his bared teeth. "Try compassion. Aquarians seem especially fond of that."

Woltar tilted his head, then nodded. He said, serenely, "Albel speaks sense, Your Excellency. I believe the girl would be an asset to Airyglyph if she were to willingly come to our side."

"I am inclined to agree. What have you to say to this, Vox?" He waited. Vox clenched his teeth. "Then it is decided." The king turned his gaze upon each of the captains. "Vox, leash your inquisitor. Woltar, find a position for the girl in the castle, preferably something humble. And Albel, I will entrust upon you the task of monitoring and dealing with the girl, since it was your idea to begin with."

"Of course."

As Woltar bowed and exited the room and the king followed shortly after, Vox whirled on the remaining person in the room. "I have been informed about your little incident at the Kirlsa training facility," he said lowly. "Do not think you'll get away with this, Albel."

"I wouldn't dream of it." His expression did not change; if anything, it veered towards amusement. "I'll look forward to what you will do, Vox. Until then."

Vox was left staring at the sauntering man's back. A black expression twisted the lines on his face.

-------

It occurred to Sophia that her mind must be touched with inane sanity, because she could not remember precisely why she had thought the wilderness a safer place than the escape pod. Notwithstanding the broken pieces of equipment, the pod would have, at the very least, been a shield against the cold. Intelligent creature that she was, however, she opted to embrace the snowstorm and retard her mind to unconsciousness.

So when Sophia awoke to the smell of rot clogging her nose, the first thought that flashed through her mind was none at all. She was too busy disarming the sensations assailing her person.

First was the floor. Frigid stone reared to the curve of her fingers, every plane slick with fluid and damp with moss, and she quickly drew her hands away and stood. Or would have, if the bones in her body had not locked up and crumpled her knees halfway through the motion. The clack of bone against stone sucked the breath right out of her; she kneeled, clenching her eyes. For a wild moment the irony of the scene caught her, and she nearly smiled the same teetering smile. The whim was dashed away with her next breath. The smell of rot returned, instantaneous as a sonic boom. The tang of iron was in there as well, a bitter scent of imprisonment in air thickened with the molecules of the dead.

She realized she was shivering. She touched the back of her hand to her forehead, and drew it back to her side. The motion had been instinctive; Sophia knew she would not feel the heat radiating against her hand. Still, she enacted the movement, if only to reinforce what she already knew. Her vision was awash with a fevered haze, and she knew the cold that clutched her body was not from the chilly air alone. One could expect no less, she supposed, five days wandering in a snowstorm.

Pressing her knees to her chest, she slumped her head on them and closed her eyes. A weariness crept over her, dull and hazy. She was glad to be alive, but being in a prison cell most certainly damned that feeling.

She listened to the coughs echoing off the walls. They were dry, hacking, continuing because they could not be stopped. Each cough sounded the same, deprived of substance, deprived of hope, and Sophia did not look beyond the iron bars. Torches were stationed at the columns of stone between the prison cells, but the light they spluttered was more mockery than illumination; the prisoners became vague figures against a backdrop of shuddering darkness.

It took a moment for Sophia to identify the sound of keys clicking against iron. It took another for her to raise her head and stare blankly at the man in front of her.

"Come with me, child."

The man stood in tolerant neutrality as Sophia struggled to her feet. He was old, well beyond middle age, the top of his head bald though ringed with white a little lower. His appearance was clean, his robes dark with saturated hues. A smile was folded within the lines of his face, and thick eyebrows protruded over sunken, benevolent eyes. His voice was soft and intoned with tranquil amusement.

"We have a proposition for you."

Fever clouded her mind and Sophia nodded. She followed him.

-------

Mae was a stocky woman who strode more than she walked. She had hair the color of burnt pastry, with an abundance of white streaks that she declared to be icing. Her eyes were sharp as a kitchen knife; her arms, compacted with muscle, though they did not show it. They hung often at her sides, a little bent at the elbows, as if the next moment would come bearing some request for her.

Mae was the cook of Airyglyph castle. At the age of fifty-four, she had long since discarded her last name with the assurance that one name said it all. She did not like to supervise; her hands were first to shape the batter, cut the meat. But her hands were not last to touch the plates. She liked to watch her assistants arrange the meals into what they perceived to entreat the appetite. She said she possessed little creativity.

What she did possess was known by all the residents of Airyglyph castle. Her name was not said with pride or awe, as owed to the leader of successful skirmishes, but the meals she crafted were loudly praised. The assistants blushed, mumbled that it was not them, when the soldiers would bellow their delight. Mae said nothing. She preferred to stay in the kitchen and bury her hands in the hues of fruit and the reds of meat. It was said the only times she smiled were when she was cooking.

It was to Mae that Sophia, after one day's sound rest, was brought.

"What skills have you, girl?"

Sophia answered automatically. Her subdued voice, however, still held undertones of bewilderment. "Sewing, cleaning, and cooking mostly, ma'am. I have some experience with medicine."

"Cooking, eh? What dishes have you on hand? Know how to bake? Roast? Stir-fry?"

"I can do any of those things."

"Oh ho, can you now, little lady? Take this. Make a loaf of bread with it."

"A loaf of bread?"

"Yes, the kind that's edible, if you please."

"That's…all?"

"What were you expecting? Pheasants, beef, some grand ingredient? I'm not wasting meat on you until I'm certain of your worth. It's hard enough buying wheat in this green-forsaken country. Well, what are you waiting for? Hurry up and impress me already. I've not all day."

Sophia lifted a bucket uncertainly. The cook raised an eyebrow and cocked her thumb toward the door near the stove. She hurried outside, drew water from the well, returned and fixed her concentration on her task.

Fear—not sprung of mistrust but failure—coated her actions like a dusting of flour. It clung to her hands, impressed a wet mark across the sticky dough, stilted her fingers as they fumbled to burn the coals. Even as the dough began to shape and grow under the incessant caress of heat, her palms came together and squelched batter through the slits of her fingers.

All the while the cook watched, tolerant, impassive, a crook to her mouth that could have meant anything.

"I'm done," Sophia said quietly.

"No salt?" the cook asked, an eyebrow raised.

"No salt. I thought it too precious to waste."

"Hm." The crook tilted; Sophia thought she looked pleased.

She watched, the batter hardening on her hands, as the woman tore a piece from the bread and threw it in her mouth. In the corner of the kitchen, the fireplace battled the inevitable. The flames inside spluttered furiously, threw shadows on the cook's mouth, warped her enlarged cheeks. Sophia wished for nothing more at that moment than fluorescent lighting. She felt again the iron bars enclosed around her and the torches across from her. Only this time, the expression on the figure was visible.

Sophia did not have long to wait.

"You disgust me."

"What?"

"You disgust me, girl," the cook repeated, a frown dragging across her mouth. "Go find yourself a man."

"I-I beg your par—"

"You will not beg my pardon. What's a girl like you doing here, catering to bloodthirsty men in a dingy castle?"

"But—"

"You shouldn't have come here, little lady. Now that I've seen your skills, I cannot permit you to leave. Attempt to escape and I will be after you faster than any of those puny suits of armor they call guards. What's your name, girl?"

"S-Sophia, ma'am."

"Name's Mae. Drop the ma'am. Trust me, you wouldn't keep it up for long."

"O-Okay." Sophia shifted uneasily in the ensuing silence. She ventured, "When do I begin work?"

Mae cut her off. "Just a second. Mayu!"

A bleary-eyed girl stumbled into the kitchen. "Ma'am?"

"You're demoted, Mayu. Take your things and head for the servants' quarter. I'll let you know your assignments when you're properly awake. Go back to sleep."

"Yes, ma'am." The girl exited the room, eyes still dreamy. Sophia looked after her, shocked.

"What were you saying? Oh, right. You can start now. Here, take this flour and work a miracle into it. Use salt this time. It's in the cupboard, over there."

A change seemed to overcome the cook. The digging quality about her eyes disappeared, though they retained their observing look. A looseness accompanied her movements; her frown had rubbed away, and an almost benevolent curve graced her mouth. Her gaze was focused on the batter Sophia was kneading. "Ah, girl, you have come just in time. News has gone around of some prisoners escaping, and my assistants have been scared witless ever since. The featherheads, they've dropped four trays in one day, thinking the prisoners are lurking around here somewhere." She straightened suddenly. "Say, Sophia, was it?" A glint entered the woman's eyes. "You aren't afraid of feeding a few prisoners in the dungeon, are you?"

The old man—Woltar's—words resurfaced in her head. _We have a proposition for you_, the man had said. _You may work and sleep in the castle, or you may refuse and return to the dungeon. It is your choice_. The serene smile he wore had suggested no choice. And this scared her, because a proposition implied motives on both sides; and he had shown her no purpose behind his offer to see her alive.

With this thought in mind, Sophia smiled weakly in response to the cook, knowing she could do no less.

"Perfect. You'll start the rounds tomorrow."

-------

AN: One parting note. I have an appalling tendency to edit and re-edit little things, so if you think you're seeing a word you didn't see before, you're probably right. Any major changes I'll list at the bottom.

Criticism of any kind would be greatly appreciated.

Edit: Changed the paragraph with Sophia checking herself for fever. Thanks to Dragon Chyld for pointing that out. :)

(3/8/07)


	3. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Star Ocean 3 does not belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this.

**AN:** Title changed. Thanks to Fallacy for pointing out _exactly_ how I felt about the previous title. Even if this story was started on a whim, the title Of Damsels and Katanas struck me as wrong. So, it's out with the old, and in with the new. Took me long enough, lol. Enjoy!

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Chapter 2**

The days did not pass with the momentum of one boulder rolling down an incline, toward the leveled plain known as routine, but with the sporadic frequency of one wave crashing against the next. Each day was a struggle to retain a sense of balance, to remain unmoved against forces that thrust her anyway. The sky, suspect to the same patterns as on Earth, was her one solace. A glance to the sky reminded her that here, time still flowed the same way, even if the time period in itself was off.

It had jarred her, at first. To know that on Earth, time was ticking away with the same speed, and that time did not halt there just because she was here. It became reassuring later, to know that she still passed life within the dimensions of reality. Even if the dimensions were more than a little warped.

The absence of a clock disconcerted her. On the rare occasions it opened, she found herself gazing out the door which led to the well, to catch a glimpse of sunlight. The castle was constructed entirely of stone, and thus, in accordance with its immense weight, afforded few windows, and all without glass. The kitchen did not contain windows; the slits on the door alone provided ventilation. Sophia had lapses of melancholy but did not complain. She had enough to occupy herself with inside the castle.

On Earth, Sophia had been labeled odd for enjoying the domesticities of every day life. It felt strange that on this planet, her idiosyncrasies should become praiseworthy talents. She recalled that the students of her school had glanced at her with averted eyes when, instead of professing a passionate love for all things virtual, Sophia announced cheerfully that she preferred sewing thread to wires and frying pans to computers. That had given her a wide berth. Few could withstand the guilt of having her as a friend. Fayt, her childhood friend, was the exception, of course. Her admonishments would reach him for the hours they spent together; then, the next day, she would find him with his imaginary sword (virtual, he argued, not imaginary; she ignored him) in hand, whacking away at some invisible monster. She found him exasperating, even if it was a secret joy of hers to chide him and watch him make it up to her.

Unfortunately, few things on this planet tugged her heart towards joy. The cook Mae barked out such a frenzy of orders, that Sophia collapsed into bed the first two nights with nerves that in no way trembled with delight at having her favorite hobby recognized and finally approved. She suspected it was that approval which drove the cook to practically shackle her to the oven.

After the first day, when she slept away her fever, her days began simply enough. Wake up, wash the face, scrub the hands, dress in the uniform provided.

It tumbled downhill from there.

The dungeons were her first stop. Pot in hand, terrified smile in place, she would descend the echoing steps to torch-lit darkness. In front of each cell she bent her arm at awkward angles to keep the ladle from touching the sweat-coated, oddly scented iron bars. The clack of ladle against earthen pot and bowls sounded unbearably loud in the silence her arrival triggered. Sometimes she heard—not saw—the trickling of something too steady to be water dripping from the ceilings. It had the desired effect; she flushed scarlet, and when she passed one cell in particular, she thought she heard dry, crude laughter.

Scarlet was not the only color she wore on her face. White and sickly gray were also rather becoming in her eyes and cheeks. She thanked the torches for their dimness, for otherwise, the arms that snaked out to grasp soup-laden bowls would incur far more than mere terror. She saw crawling discolorations that could have been burn marks or dried blood; she wrenched her eyes from dismembered hands which fumbled to clutch the bowls rightly. One prisoner hunched over the bowl where it sat, because his hands were shaking so violently. The prisoner ate while Sophia, arrested to a mute horror, stared into wide, hair-fringed eyes.

Where was she? What manner of planet was this?

Sophia fled the dungeons the moment the last bowl was filled. Past iron bars, past a barred door. Twice a day she had to do this: once before breakfast and again after lunch. Mae looked on with what might have been sympathy, if not for the appraising glint in her eyes.

Breakfast, lunch, and dinner afforded her hardly any time to think beyond breads and meat, sweetmeats and cheese. The castle consisted mostly of soldiers, so meals could be shifted as much as an hour before or after the accustomed time, depending on how hard the generals worked the soldiers. Keeping food warm or heating it at an instant's notice was a miserable affair, on this planet. It was the main reason why Sophia could not settle into a routine.

Mae was lenient about one thing, however: after dinner and clean-up duty, Sophia was free to wander the castle. When asked if that meant the entire castle, the cook smiled. That leashed Sophia's curiosity. She stuck to open doors and hesitated to knock on the antisocial ones. Maddeningly, there were no signs to indicate the persons inside a room. All the doors looked the same: heavy oak with bolts across them. Sophia upset more than one person, mistaking one room for another. She was glad there were not many rooms (that she saw) in the castle.

It was obvious that Airyglyph—for so this place was named—was a militant kingdom, from the sheer number of soldiers Sophia served at the dining hall.

It was on the third day, while stepping out into the Airyglyph training grounds, that Sophia placed a face to the presence that haunted her since she set foot inside the kitchen.

-------

Red. She was sure of it.

How fitting that he would have demon's eyes, contained within a smooth, pale expanse of skin—or was it crafted, molded, by some brilliant sculptor driven insane with his vision of perfection? His eyes, his lips, held the promise of a curve, of a beauty that was neither masculine nor feminine, but a wondrous reproduction of the two.

But they—his eyes, his lips—were twisted, twisted, as only perfection can be.

The promise was broken, or, perhaps not broken, but betrayed, by the crescent-thin darkness that was his eyes. They mocked gently; they scorned with the uplifting of his eyelashes. His lips curved in the correct fashion, but faltered, at the critical point, and became the travesty to the smile—the smirk.

He smirked. She was not aware that she had screamed out loud.

She did not look at the other soldiers but at him, only at him, when the training died away and the suits swiveled in her direction. Somewhere, her mind registered the cold, gently prodding her hands to wrap around her waist. She saw that above his waist, at the stomach, and at his arms, too, his skin was laid bared. She wondered, fleetingly, if he was cold. The fluidity with which he shifted towards her, a movement that was softer than the fall of snow, seemed to belie that thought.

He bore the only color in this white wasteland of targets, arrows, swords, and suits of armor. In his hand, he held a weaving of red, with white diamond holes down the center. The tightness with which he clutched his sword, like roots inseparable from the ground, unhinged, at last, the iron that bound her feet.

She grasped the oaken door and stepped away. It was a mimicry to the way she had entered the training grounds, but she knew that the footsteps which echoed down the corridors were a far cry from her usual gait.

How could one impression smear so irrational a disquiet across her heart?

The cook said nothing when she retired to bed early. Once dinner's ordeal was over, time was her possession alone.

She dreamt of prisoners, torture chambers, and perfection. Before dawn, the cook and her assistants were gone, rustles of fabric in the kitchen next door. Her heart refused to thud. Beside her curled form, in front of her neck—a whisper. A gleam. A pattern of red, diamonded with white. Not an imaginary sword.

"Why have you been following me?" she whispered.

She wanted Fayt.

It was their first interaction.

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Edit: 'juxtaposition' to 'reproduction.' Not the meaning I intended. How sad is this, I editted my edit notes...

(3/17/07)


	4. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** Star Ocean 3 does not belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this.

**AN:** In answer to a question I received and in case anyone else was wondering, there will be no smut in this story. This fic is purely for my enjoyment, so nothing above a teen rating here. Though I'm a little iffy about the enjoyment part…I revised this chapter so many times, I'm still cracking up—and beating myself—from it. Enjoy the chapter!

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Chapter 3**

The words hung for one moment in the air and then were discarded, deliberately ignored.

Strange, how terrified Sophia was—her instincts screamed at her to run, to get away from this man, did she not _see_ the sword at her neck?—yet how perfectly her limbs were held in paralysis. Her breath came quiet, even; a noose clenched round her heart even as it pounded in feeble, staccato beat. This outward calm coupled with inward frenzy thrust aside, at last, the strands of sleep webbing her eyes.

She had not heard him enter. Less startling than the animated shadow, he had appeared like a breath of wind, unacknowledged until the moment of interaction. The composition of his form was so impeccably complete--not one trait awkward or displaced--that the air around him seemed emptier, cooler, as if dust itself had dispersed to avoid befouling this man. Through sheer power of will, Sophia catalogued his features as they were marked.

Black-brown hair, yellow straw at the tips. Sharply angular face. Lean, sparse body, corded with muscle. A shirt, a skirt, whose fabric was at odds with the armor plating his haughty shoulders. A claw, in place of a left hand. A right hand, human, snaked around a sword's hilt. Whose blade was inches from delivering death.

She did not scream. She did not move. Her movements were halted so long as his own remained unmoved.

How strange it was, that the both of them were bound in complete stasis. She expected him to spring, at any moment, like a trap, metal sinking into her flesh, expelling the breath from her lips. In one second-tinged moment the anxiety of the previous days would be swiped clean and a smile, true and brilliantly cheerful, would beam forth from her lips, thanking him even as her heart twisted with resentment.

But he, looming over her, continued to stare. The height discrepancy did not tone down the intensity of his eyes, as distance should have, but acted in the reverse; the gray of the ceiling singled out the red, chiseled it to a thing of brightness in the midst of dreary stone. As if fed on the rays of the predawn light, his eyes glowed.

Was he angry? Did emotion fuel the light behind his eyes? Or was he truly a demon, cast from the flames of hell to torment her with his burning stare?

The stasis was broken. Sophia threw herself against the wall as his katana sliced cleanly through the bed sheets. In one hand Sophia gripped her cat key chain--a trinket from Fayt. The thought of her childhood friend injected her mind with clarity. If Sophia died, she would never see Fayt again.

"Why are you angry?" she asked unstably, watching as he readied his katana.

"Why do you pity me?" he returned, so coolly that she knew anger froze his words.

"I don't know who you are."

"Yet you pity me." Swipe. A fumbled dodge. "Why?"

Blood slipped down her right arm, staining the white bed sheets, the white of her nightgown. One hand rose automatically to staunch the bleeding; the other clutched the key chain as if it were a lifeline.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Mocking laughter, hateful sneer.

She scrambled to avoid the next swing. He was deliberately slowing his attacks; she had just enough time to move before his sword picked up speed and flashed to the side.

"The man, Woltar," she said quickly, "he told me I would be safe in this castle if I worked."

"You are under my charge, worm. The old man has no say if I override his decision." He slid his sword from the bed. "Tell me, maggot, what do you know of the contraption in which you came here?"

It struck Sophia that she had given no thought to the UP3. Swallowing, Sophia kept her silence.

"Answer me," he ground out, drawing his sword nearer, "What is that contraption? A weapon? A new transport device?"

"It doesn't matter," she muttered, bringing her key chain close. "It's broken. I couldn't tell you how to make another."

She tensed as she awaited his next swing. It did not come. She raised her eyes. His gaze was on her key chain.

"No," she said, softly, louder, the first throes of panic beginning to race through her, fluctuating the volume, the tempo, of her monotone breathing. The key chain was her one possession on this bleak planet; she would rather face a hundred prison cells than to see it stained by the oils on a killer's hand. And yet…

Her grip tightened on the key chain, squeezing its features together until it formed a contorted expression of its own.

I'm sorry, Fayt.

She threw the key chain at the man and ran as its innards exploded in a shower of orange dust.

--------

"You liar! You told me this was for a science experiment!"

"Funny thing, that…"

"A weakening powder. I assumed you wanted to upload the item into your game but disguised it as schoolwork. I didn't know it was for real life!"

"But, if you're alone one day, and something happens to you—"

"I'll be fine, Fayt. Really, you're such a worrywart."

"_You're_ telling _me_ that? Come on, Sophia, listen to me just this once? Please?"

"…Fine."

"Good."

"But I'm never using this! I'm keeping it forever."

"You have to use it if you're in trouble."

"That's all right. I'm not worried. Fayt will always be there. Right?"

"Right."

-------

She did not cry over nearly being murdered, she did not cry under the pressure of feeding an entire castle; she cried over tossing away a trinket, a present which she helped to create. She cursed herself, when the tears blinded her and she could not tug the latch to escape, for placing so much value on a toy formulated from chemicals and dye. She cursed herself, as her forehead slid down the door to bang against the stone floor, that she could be so sentimental in so dire a situation. She fisted her hands in her hair and cursed and cursed again—

And felt the pain wash over her.

"_Witch, what have you done?"_ a voice snarled.

Metal dragged, not firmly, and in a sort of zigzag, along the crust of her left arm and formed a chain of miniature volcanoes, spurting forth ashen blood in the dim lighting. The metal was removed a moment later, when the wielder knelt on the ground and braced himself against his sword. Sweat ran down his forehead; the katana was shaking.

"Touch me and you die!" the man hissed, as Sophia extended her hand toward him. She easily maneuvered around his claw, though she stayed at arms-length afterwards.

"I'm sorry," she said, shutting her eyes.

See, Fayt? Why give me a weapon if I apologize for using it? Better if you had crafted a silly thing for me, like a gun or a sword, so I could stash it away and never regret anything. Instead you made me something dangerous, a form I could cherish. You're too practical, you idiot.

"The drug will wear off in a few days," Sophia said, quietly, wiping away her tears.

His lips curled. "And you would know, maggot?"

"I made the powder myself." Something flickered in his eyes, and disappeared. "There's pain within the first couple hours. Afterwards, the powder works a depressant on your heart and slows down movement, like adrenaline but opposite. The last stage is numbness. You can't feel pain, though once the drug wears off, any exhaustion you feel will be doubled from it being held back."

"Interesting," the man said heavily, "that a cook would be privy to such poison."

"I won't drug the castle's food, if that's what you're implying," Sophia shot out indignantly. "I researched it for a friend." She paused. "That is, he needed it for an experiment… a good kind of experiment and he was horrible at alchemy so he asked me. Not that I make it often. Or at—"

"Shut up, maggot," the man growled, "and give me the damn cure."

For a makeshift cure she could bargain her life. Four days—for Sophia knew agility was a necessity to a fighter of his stature and garb—she could guarantee her safety from this man. Except, looking at the way he trembled and attempted to rise, the barest of scowls pulling at his flesh, the only indications of the pain she knew he was suffering, Sophia could not bring herself to lie. Not quite remorse, but a bitter shame prickled along her heart. Sophia had believed herself above the vulgar act of tormenting, regardless of the circumstances.

So she told the truth. "I didn't research the cure." At his incredulous look, she added, "The drug isn't potent. Since the effects eventually wear off, I didn't think the cure necessary." She had intended to keep it forever, a product of Fayt's crafting and her alchemy. She turned away from the man's dark glare.

When Sophia threw the key chain, she had targeted it towards skin, so the powder would be nearest to blood. Adhered to the man's stomach, which was sawdusted with powder and sweat combined, there was a piece of fabric with the feline guardian's smile. All the rest of the orange pieces had fallen to the ground, strewn about like remnants of a brilliant sacrifice. Despite the man's warning, Sophia reached to peel off the smile but was surprised when, her head reeled and her arm hardly budged.

"Oh," she said softly as pain, acknowledged, pounded against her. Sophia had forgotten that both her arms bled. Crouching back, she regarded the cuts, fascinated. Something was welling up, jolted by revulsion from seeing so much dark red. The blood on her right arm had dried up, but the blood on her left was still trickling.

Sophia had done it before, during one of the few times she gamed with Fayt. Say a word, he had told her, and imagine it come to life. The longer you hold the image, the longer the effect lasts. Breathing heavily, Sophia made her way underneath her bed. Fayt referred to the game, of course, but Sophia had felt something shift inside her—her real self and not the virtual one—when she followed his instructions.

Wrapping her fingers around her staff (she was wrong, after all; here was one possession more that was hers), Sophia imagined flesh knitting back together and breathed the word, "Heal."

A glow, a tingle. Warmth. Her arms no longer ached. She might have stared in wonder, had not her head still spun and exhaustion shook her being. How ridiculous, since she had woken up only minutes ago. Or was it hours? Sophia turned towards the window—and was arrested by the image before she turned completely. Sunlight was creeping through the iron bars, spinning the yellow straw of the man's hair to dusky gold. But it was not the transmutation that caught her.

If pain were a painting, then this man was a grotesque masterpiece.

The last thing Sophia heard before slipping to unconsciousness was the door swinging open and a dry female voice.

-------

Sophia expected to wake up to a sword inches from her neck. She was surprised then, when a cup was pressed against her hands and a voice said, "Drink."

Sophia complied without thinking. A bitter taste dusted the inside of her mouth and she choked. She turned, horrified, to the source of the voice.

"It's not poisoned," Mae said dryly, moving from Sophia's bedside to the other side of the room. "The taste comes from the herbs used. It's an infusion to give you strength."

She stared down at the cup, near to vomiting. She wouldn't be able to drink it now. A faint, nauseating smell rose to kiss her nostrils; her arms were flaked with dried blood. Suddenly remembering, her head snapped up and she glanced around the room. The man was gone.

"Mae," Sophia said, shivering, breathing hard, "There was a man here who tried to kill me."

"I know," said the cook. Sensing her wide-eyed look, Mae turned from the bed sheets she was examining and clarified, "I wasn't aware until I arrived. I thought you were in the dungeons, and I didn't check on you until breakfast preparations were complete and you were still gone. When I came in, you had already fainted. Not long after, the boy left."

Surprise beat fleetingly through her. He had moved, even though weighted down by the drug? Then reason returned and awe was shoved aside. "That man," Sophia said, gripping the cup tightly, "Who was he?"

"Albel Nox, though many call him Albel the Wicked. I'm surprised," Mae remarked. She tugged the sheets from the mattress. "I've known the boy since he was a child. This is the first time he's struck while his opponent was weaponless. Something about you must have set him off." She held up the ripped and blood-spotted sheets pointedly.

"I didn't do anything…"

"Woltar brought you to me, but the boy informed me that you were his charge." The cook drawled, "If I didn't see it myself, I might have believed there was more than fighting going on here." The implication was slow to dawn but the blush was complete as sunrise. "Where did you say you were from, Sophia?" Mae questioned shrewdly.

The sudden change in topic threw Sophia off. Mind still scrambled from embarrassment, the girl could do little more than stare at the cook.

"Did you come with those two prisoners?"

"Two prisoners?"

"The ones that escaped about a week ago." A wet cloth was presented to her and Sophia accepted it gratefully. "My assistants informed me that one of them was a blond-haired man. Neither was fed, though one noted the blonde as he was transferring cells. They didn't catch sight of the other."

"Oh." Fayt…had he managed to escape Hyda safely, or did he have to experience the same things as her, on another planet? Captioned in a hostile environment, unable to reveal her identity beyond her name because of an omniscient, skewed law… How she wished her best friend were here, to help her solve this dilemma.

Mae stood, appraising her. "Well?"

The full truth was out of the question. But to lie? Sophia's stomach knotted. It was not so much that Sophia could not lie; it was that her lies were detected point-blank, stranger or no. Hers was a tremolo voice, untuned to the frequency of confidence.

"I…" Sophia started. And stopped. "I'm from...another country. On another continent. Across the sea." The blush was returning. Its hue now bordered on the dusky end of the day though, because each word she spoke was a stake through her grave. "And I—"

"You are my foster child, whom I've only recently recognized because you, rebellious bird, returned years ago to your friends in Greeton, an engineering town on the continent of Gaitt. Thinking to impress me, you stocked up on ingredients in that contraption your friends made for you, but crashed into the mountains and burned it all up." Mae frowned. "What a waste. We could have used that for the war.

"The castle residents don't remember you because you were a nuisance around the castle, peeking into keyholes and chasing after dashing men, so you lived in a remote house in the city. You were dreamy and obnoxious but a sweet enough replacement for a daugh—"

The woman halted as two arms were thrown around her shoulders. Her eyes went wide, and the arms that hung so loosely down her sides were completely still. For one moment a brightness entered the woman's eyes and it looked as if a tilt, a curve upward in both directions of the mouth was impending; but then the expression smoothed to something more domesticated, and her voice, when she spoke, was only a trifle kinder-pitched than usual:

"Don't cry, Sophia. I don't foster crybabies."

She was not crying. Her eyes were squeezed too tightly shut and she was smiling too marvelously hard to cry. "Why would you trust me?"

"Have you given me reason to suspect you?" Mae said, removing the girl's arms in a gesture that was not quite gentle, not quite brusque. "Poison my food, and I'll have you kicked out of this castle before the king's watch hears of it. On matters of politics…when you're an old bat like me, child, you tire of intrigue. Besides," she added, "I'd be a fool to chop off a pair of talented hands when it's offered to me."

"Thank you, Mae," Sophia whispered.

"Don't thank me," the cook said, a touch of her dryness reemerging. "You still have to complete the rounds."

"I really mean it."

The cook snorted. "Of course you do. Now, get moving. I expect you to double your efforts from now on. No more skipping meal preparations."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And change out of that dress, child. You look a bloody mess."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Make me feel an old lady, would you?"

"You just referred to yourself as an old bat," Sophia pointed out.

Mae's eyes twinkled. "Hmph. Don't get smart with me. Now, move. I need to change these sheets."

"But you told me that the assistants—"

"Charity, Sophia," said the cook, arching an eyebrow. "Learn to take it when it's offered."

To that Sophia had nothing to say, so she changed into her uniform and hurried to the dungeons, still smiling.

-------

Edit: Cut out a paragraph and some minor details.

(4/17/07)


	5. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** Star Ocean 3 does not belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this.

Quick reminder: Sophia rested one day before becoming an assistant to Mae.

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Chapter 4**

Date? Second month of winter, Day 10.

Name of prisoner? Refuses to say.

Cell number? One.

Status? Back bleeding from whip lashes. Feverish. But still conscious and eating properly.

Information gained? None.

Name of prisoner?…

And so the log continued, one entry per day for each prisoner.

It was easy for the receptionist to the dungeons to become a jaded man. There was little joy in penning these entries in such clinical, detached terms. Harder still, was witnessing the often brutal torture inflicted on the prisoners and having to record the events without a sound.

Granted, these prisoners were on the enemy's side. Pity was wasted on them; they deserved to be behind bars. How many Glyphians had these savages killed? Their fathers, their brothers? Their mothers and sisters?

But hate was hard to retain when guilt seeped in with each passing day.

When he first began his job, the receptionist to the dungeons questioned aloud the morality of torture. Questioning turned to near rebellion; fierceness, to outrage. And finally, anger—bold words, burning conviction—dissolved to resignation. No more was said on justice. Enlightening the Inquisitor on prisoners being human beings, at any rate, was an effort wasted.

But the reports on the prisoners' status continued to be a torture. The receptionist began to wish—after attempting to block out his conscience and failing—he might acquire a companion to share his thoughts with. Simply the comfort of another body beside him might, perhaps, help him to forget how much he loathed his job and his cowardice for not quitting. It was either this or be drafted for the war. Even now he couldn't bring himself to choose the war.

As the receptionist was stuck behind this particular counter nearly all hours of his life, his choice of companions was rather limited. The dungeons held a specimen which people did not like to see behind bars, so women—people—naturally avoided them. His selection, then, was narrowed to the assistants from the kitchen.

The same assistant didn't always come everyday to feed the prisoners, but, for sure, they came twice a day. Not much time at all to analyze their personalities—enough to know he wouldn't confide in any one of them. They wore their terror of rats openly, their disgust of the prisoners too plainly. The assistants were comely enough, he supposed, but he doubted they would care one whit for his ideas. Or he for theirs.

This attitude changed when, three days ago, one assistant entered the hall and smiled at him.

He'd never thought to see again the foreign girl who was released from the dungeons hardly a week before (for release often led to public execution), but see her he did. And in the assistant's apparel, no less! From the moment she smiled, he knew this girl had a warmth the other assistants could never hope to possess. He almost wanted to stop her from descending those steps to that world of caged men despised and despising. But he didn't.

She came back and he smiled. Her stiff posture, her dry, drooping eyes screamed of guilt for a crime uncommitted. He bowed to her clumsy curtsy.

From that day on the receptionist utilized his eye for detail in a way that, finally, gave him a bit of joy. The girl was pretty, no doubt, but he loved best to note her mannerisms and from them glean her thoughts. It was a puzzle in which he couldn't be sure of the pieces: the curve of her eyes and mouth were very telling, but so it was with any person. He wanted to know _more_.

It was now, on the third day since their meeting, that the receptionist envisioned her. He wondered why the morning had not brought her person. He had long since extinguished the fire under the cauldron to preserve the soup's texture. Had another taken her place?

When the hallway door opened and the girl padded in, the receptionist almost wanted to say another assistant _did_ snatch her away. But such was not the case. The girl was here, in the flesh.

Only…winter had descended over her eyes as a sheet of frost might suddenly cover a field of dewy grass. Little time must have passed since she was affected: the girl appeared warm still; the frost had yet to numb by chilling blood to brittle ice. Still, the change was disquieting. A smile was petering from her lips—those sweet rose petals, withered, to pink-injected gray! No shadows were added to the bleached sand of her face, but the shadows fairly leered when the girl's sunken eyes allowed them a darker haunting. Her pale hand strayed once to her side, and a pained look rippled throughout when the fingers passed straight through air. Something orange, he recalled, had peeked out from the sash of her uniform.

The receptionist watched as the girl tugged the cauldron from the cold hearth—a little soup spilling down the sides—and passed him with haunted step, nervous gaze. _There _was a change! The urge to follow pulsed strong, but the receptionist checked himself. Perhaps some emergency had threatened the castle of which he was not aware?

All too likely, for the girl bore a familiar look when she returned.

The receptionist had seen many a prisoner in his lifetime. Fear, anger, and despair were the predominant emotions which prisoners bore. This girl, it seemed, had found herself inside a prison once more. Only this time the bars were contrived by another's hand and self-compounded by insecurity.

-------

On her way back to the castle from her home in Airyglyph city, one of the assistants caught a cold from the blizzard that swept up again. Though she tended mostly to the ovens, Sophia was called in to serve lunch in her stead at the dining hall.

The dimensions of the dining hall were carved in height: the ceiling was high, the walls stifling close. One table spanned the entirety of the hall. Along it sat men—tall, hardened, dried of cheer, bellowing laughter if only to hear a sound not cried out from pain. Ale sloshed over wood slick from the press of greasy fingers. It was more a result from carelessness than quantity poured; the captains at the head of the table, towards the shadowy back wall, cast a calculating eye over their men. The pattern of their gazes was unpredictable, scorching.

Sophia looked up and felt Albel's eyes on her like a physical blow.

"Don't stand there, Sophia," a servant murmured gently. The girl—Mayu was her name—deposited a plate in her empty hands. "Take this to the end of the table, there. See it?"

Sophia was already staring in the direction indicated. Before she could beg an escape, the servant was gone, collecting trays in her wake.

Compelled by duty, her feet began to trudge. Sophia drowned her fear in the swell of sound around her; dragged it low as she approached the side opposite the man who threatened her life but hours ago. Smile, her mind told her fiercely, as she stretched her arms to deposit the plate. Steady. Ignore him. Don't let the man break down your composure!

It was impossible. Her elbows over the table angulated; the plate slipped and boomed; food tossed upward a distance and gravity reassembled it in disarray.

No more than four heads at the end of the table turned to eye Sophia, despite her acute humiliation. One man's gaze was harsher than the rest. Reason told Sophia to ignore him, but its insidious sibling curiosity emerged the victor of the two.

Grooves. Shadows. Intensified, by a scowl that carved a stony, gem-cut face. Except there was nothing beautiful about his face at all; only the texture, the thousands of rough cuts till the facets somewhat resembled flesh over bone, was likened to a gem. His flesh lacked color; it repelled light, suckled in shadows. He hated her and Sophia knew it in an instant.

"Pardon me," she said lowly, stumbling back.

"Your name?" the man demanded, so suddenly that Sophia stopped where she was, afraid to move.

"Sophia Esteed, sir."

The man swiveled to the old man seated across from him. His accusing glare was aimed first at him, then at the younger man beside Woltar. Sophia felt uncertain of the smirk that crossed Albel's lips.

"Sophia Esteed," the scowling man repeated, as if the name were a thing of disgust. She blanched as his gaze swept up and down her person. "A filthy servant," she heard him mutter. He rose then without a word and stormed from the hall, his cloak flaring furiously behind him.

Not knowing what she was apologizing for, Sophia pardoned herself again.

"Vox has a volatile temper. There is no need to apologize for it, child," said the other man of the four she didn't recognize. The king, from the position he commanded at the table. Quickly Sophia swept into a bow, averting her eyes respectfully. She had never encountered a king before. Would she be thrown in the dungeons for standing while the king was sitting? Should she be kneeling? But the ground was hideous, with grease and ale and stray pieces of meat. She was only given two uniform sets…

It was Albel, irony of ironies, who freed her. "Don't you have a job to do, maggot?"

She couldn't help the grateful look she shot his way. With a flushed "If you'll excuse me, Your Highness" and a deep, long curtsy, Sophia hardly waited five seconds for a response before she scuttled off. She collected plates from the entrance area only and was careful not to look idle again.

-------

Dinner continued in the same vein, though it was harder to look occupied when dinner lasted an hour longer than lunch. Fate must have found the greatest delight in magnetizing her to Albel's gaze: each time she emerged from behind a soldier, his glare pinpointed her faster than a compass needle swings north. Halfway through the meal, Sophia quitted the dining hall altogether.

By the second dish Sophia muddled up in the kitchen, mixing too much flour in one and too little in another, Mae had cast off her watcher status. Steering her into the castle corridors, the cook dumped a mop and a bucket of water into Sophia's hands, barked, "Now calm yourself!" and strode back into the kitchen.

Sophia sagged against the stone wall. For a moment she looked at her hands and exhaled. They were coated with flour, white. Shaking.

Sophia looked down the corridors. Not one footstep stirred the silence; all were at dinner. She could have inhabited a tomb, so still it was. But it was not uncomfortable.

It always contented Sophia to scrub dirt from a surface; to make brightness dulled shine forth again. With more energy than she thought she had, Sophia worked her way down the corridors and paused only when the water in the bucket was black. Sophia crouched beside the bucket, frowning, debating to return to the kitchen or to pack snow from the training grounds when she looked up and there he was.

The world is a funny thing. Those whom we seek with desperation, with driven, unexplainable need, are forever missed, perhaps by mere feet. Those whom we continually yearn to avoid are the ones who appear most often within our line of sight.

In the open middle of the corridor, the greatest cloak for Sophia was complete lack of motion; she employed this instantly. Her hands stilled; the only thing she dared move was her eye. It tracked Albel's agonizing progress—the poison was forgotten—across the corridor intersecting hers. He paused at the end; she grew cold; he continued on; she dared breathe.

With her next breath surfaced a sudden desire, dizzying in its intensity. _She wanted to get out of here._ No more of this. No more skittering around, no more fearing each end of a damn corridor as if it would spawn the devil incarnate. If Sophia knew what she had done to upset this castle, she would gladly make peace. Better yet, if she caused so much anguish, _let her leave._ What worth did she have? Her last possession was tossed away, the machine she had come here in—crumpled, charred.

The escape pod. An urgency to see the pile of scrap, to rummage its scattered contents and, beyond all hope, uncover a communicator still in tact, possessed her. That a rescue team had been sent out for her, Sophia Esteed, out of the hundreds estranged from Hyda, was laughable, but the thought once snatched would not be crushed, not so long as there was the slimmest chance of it being true.

-------

Sophia approached the people of Airyglyph castle, bearing what she knew to be a cheerful smile, hoping to spark a smile in return. Perhaps the ceaseless cold froze their compassion; what quirk reached the corners of their mouths depressed quickly to a look of suspicion. Residents of the castle eyed Sophia with a diffidence that seemed to suggest any change in their home was a bad one. Even the assistants resented Sophia to a degree. That a newcomer with no background (they scoffed Mae's story, not aloud) and inferior looks should win the cook's approval in so short a time—unbelievable! The girl was a fake, a fluke, with those wide eyes of hers and that irritating child-like ignorance. Did she think herself better than them, casting those pitying smiles?

The assistants were a common lot: cordial when face-to-face, sniveling when out of earshot, for no reason save that insecurity drove them to spite. They talked always in comparison. They encouraged compliments with fake modesty, because they could not discern their worth for themselves.

Sophia, smartly, avoided them whenever she could. Not out of deference but a simple desire to keep the peace.

One assistant proved the exception. Ironically, the assistant Sophia befriended was the one Mae demoted during Sophia's first day in the kitchen. Mayu was misplaced, the girl herself told Sophia. An incident at the Kirlsa Training Facility had sent her packing for Airyglyph and her punishment was to slave under Mae's iron fist. With Sophia's addition though, Mayu told her cheerfully, she had nothing to worry about. The cook's "demotion" was to forbid her to touch the sacred ingredients of the kitchen. As it stood, Mayu liked to bake but loved daydreaming more.

It was from Mayu that Sophia learned her escape pod had crashed into the Traum Mountains.

"The Traum Mountains is the pass between Airyglyph and Kirlsa," Mayu was explaining as she peered over Sophia's shoulder at the forming dough. Mae had left earlier, called out for something, and the other assistants were gone since it was after dinner. "I saw some gray thing there buried underneath a huge mound of snow. I thought it might be a new weapon of the castle, but," hummed the girl, "it was broken when I looked closer."

Sophia stopped kneading. "When was this?"

The girl tilted her head, frowning delicately. "A week ago, I think. Yes. I remember because I was headed for Airyglyph after they dismissed me. Is something the matter?"

It was the sixth day since Sophia set foot inside the kitchen—a week since she was released from the dungeon. Sophia resumed kneading and allowed herself a small smile. The "gray thing" which Mayu described could only be the escape pod. She would find a way to these Traum Mountains. "It's nothing, Mayu. You mentioned a dismissal? What happened, if you don't mind me asking?"

Though the two were clearly alone, the girl lowered her voice to a whisper: "You won't tell anyone if I tell you, Sophia?"

Intrigued, Sophia shook her head. "I promise."

Mayu glanced around and, still in hushed tones, said, "Do you know those prisoners? The ones that escaped about a week and a half ago?"

"I heard about them from Mae. There were two of them?"

"Yes. Well, a few days after they escaped, they arrived at the Kirlsa Training Facility, to rescue some friends of theirs. I was with mama at the time, on the third floor. We were in charge of feeding the soldiers. The two men came in, and I thought they were soldiers at first, because you have to either be real strong to defeat the soldiers or be one yourself to make it to the third floor."

"What told you they weren't?" asked Sophia, lowering her voice, too, to a whisper.

"They weren't wearing the black armor of the Black Brigade," the girl said simply. Then she clasped her hands to her cheeks. "But, oh, Sophia, that wasn't all. I wish you had _seen_ them." If it were possible for eyes to literally sparkle, Sophia had the impression that Mayu's would be doing just that. "There was a blonde man and I'm not too partial to muscular men because most are overly so, but, oh, Sophia, this man was _handsome_. He had rugged features and such a deep voice that I felt my insides might become like the stew mama was making."

A disturbing thought, but Sophia urged the girl to continue. She did, in a voice that lilted with dreaminess: "The second man was shorter than the blonde, but whereas the blonde was handsome, this man was simply perfect. He didn't have a deep voice like the blonde, but you could feel it brimming with warmth whenever he spoke. He had a gentle smile and the kindest, loveliest, green eyes, Sophia. I've never admired a man so much in so short a time!"

"I can imagine," said Sophia softly.

"Can you?" the girl said eagerly. "If I ever see that man again, I'll point him out to you. You can't miss him, Sophia. No one I've seen in Airyglyph has had hair that distinctive shade of bl—"

"Slacking off, are we?"

The girls jumped. Mae was framed in the kitchen doorway, a folder tucked under her arm, her sharp eyes glinting like her butcher's blade. A scowl threatened to unleash the cook's wrath when she spotted the dough, neglected, underneath Sophia's hands. Seeing this, Sophia hurried to busy herself.

Mae shut the door. "I entrust a task to you and I come back to a scene of girlish chattering. I should fire you both," the cook muttered grimly, striding towards her cutting board.

Mayu tilted back on her stool and had the decency to look embarrassed. "That's my fault, Mae. I was talking to Sophia about the prisoners I met at the Facility."

"I should have known you'd prattle about men the first chance you were given." The cook grabbed one of the sausages hanging off the hooks and began to slice it into thick, juicy slabs. "That brings me to my point, though." Mayu came over with a plate and the cook dropped the slices onto it. "The shipment arrived in Kirlsa."

"Oh! But I—"

"Yes, thanks to your brilliant mishap, you can't leave Airyglyph."

"What brilliant mishap?" Sophia asked, firing up the oven and depositing the dough there. She turned to the two females.

"You didn't tell her?" the cook said, surprised. To which Mayu, wringing her hands, replied that she had been getting to that part. Mae snorted. She rinsed off her hands, addressing Sohpia, "The top floor of the Facility, where the prisoners' friends were held captive, can only be reached by elevator. Mayu handed the elevator key over to the prisoners, ensuring that Airyglyph lost both valuable hostages and its pride. Imagine, our Black Brigade pitted against three escapees and defeated!" Her voice rang with scorn.

Mayu waited for a reaction from Sophia, who hadn't commented. In truth, this was because Sophia sympathized with the escapees, herself having been a prisoner to this place. Was a prisoner still, since Sophia could neither stop working nor leave the castle of her own will. Thinking her silence signified confusion, Mayu clarified, "I was dismissed from the Facility on the charge that I assisted the prisoners."

"I'm sorry," Sophia said, awkwardly, not at all sorry that the prisoners were freed, shamefully glad that Mayu's dismissal had allowed her to make one friend in this castle. Thankfully, the subject seemed to be dropped with Mae's next words:

"Since Mayu can't leave the castle, I'll have to find someone else to head to Kirlsa."

Kirlsa. Which, according to Mayu, was right after the Traum Mountains. Where, along with her communicator, her escape pod was buried in snow. "What do you need to do there?"

"A messenger informed me that the shipment of ingredients I ordered arrived at Kirlsa yesterday. I need someone to confirm its contents." The cook opened the folder she brought with her and spoke as she skimmed what looked to be a list. "If it weren't for this ridiculous war I would have them delivered here, but all the carriages are being used to transport weapons." The cook snorted. "Apparently food is of less import than weaponry."

"But you have plenty of assistants besides me," Mayu pointed out. "Why not order one of them to help you?" Sophia's hands were suddenly clammy. She awaited the cook's reply, silently, eagerly.

"I want someone trustworthy, Mayu," the cook said dryly. "My assistants are featherheads, the whole lot of them. They complete small tasks like cleaning, sure enough, but only after squandering precious time cringing at dust and vermin. I don't need them screaming their heads off when they encounter a real monster in the mountains. The job would never get done."

By this time Sophia had turned her head away from the two and back to the oven. Convincing Mae to let her into the Traum Mountains--to have a chance at uncovering her communicator--would be a lost cause. Mae did not trust her assistants, whom she'd employed for years and years. How could the cook trust Sophia, then, after knowing her for just six days? And the cook herself having said that she would not permit Sophia to leave the castle for any reason?

Wordlessly, she listened to the two barter names with each other. The bread finished baking. The two continued to argue. Then--a rush, a tidal wave of emotion swept over her, flooded her ears with hotness, her eyes, with a burning moisture that blurred, pained, but could not be blinked away.

So many scenarios like this one. Scenarios, where indecision had clamped down her tongue. Where indecision had made her melt back into the backgrounds, to let another take the center light. But here, there was no person, no other tangible form of flesh and ambition Sophia was struggling against. Here, there was only Sophia and her fear of rejection, which held her back from pursuing her goal.

Just say it, her mind whispered. What have you to lose?

What if I'm--

Denied, rejected? Deal with it.

But she said there were monsters, I've never encountered monsters before, I could die!

Hysterical, Sophia? Where is that hard-won assurance which Mom and Dad's absence inspired in you? Was that all an act, when you would bid them good-bye with a joyful smile? _Was it all an act?_

_Yes! _Yes! I'm not so strong! I want to be home, I want someone to talk to, I want _Fayt_!

Like a child! What are you afraid of?

I'm scared, so scared, that the communicator will be broken when I find it. I don't know what I'm doing here. There's no school here, no Mom and Dad and Fayt. Please, I just want to get out of here…

So, wipe your tears. Firm your shoulders. There, just like that. And smile! Silly girl, why do you fear? You already know what you have to do.

Sophia opened her eyes to a kitchen steeped in silence. She became aware of two pairs of eyes on her, one staring, the other calmly appraising. Sophia lifted her head to meet those appraising eyes squarely.

With steady, hopeless, conviction, the words came:

"I'd like to go, Mae. Please, let me go."

And the cook let her go.

"Soldiers from the Black Brigade will accompany you tomorrow at dawn. Most are on their way to the Training Facility. Take one day, Sophia, no more."

-------

It was cold; and it was exhilarating. The woolen tunic, leggings, and scarf which Mae provided for her kept Sophia from freezing as she ploughed through a path buried in snow, and obscured by biting winds laden with frost. Though she was in the company of thirty strangers clad in bleak, black armor, how welcome was the collapse of the four walls around her! And the captain of this Brigade, the one man whose presence she had dreaded encountering, had set off before Sophia arrived. She heard the soldiers mention something about copper ore but tuned out the rest shortly after, too intent on embracing her new-found freedom.

It had the feel of an adventure. Sophia would never say so out loud, but those times when Fayt dragged her to the games and she didn't worry about being a hindrance, Sophia found the simulations and their total lack of restriction an absolute thrill. She could almost call the brisk pace the soldiers set enjoyable, except that, to her chagrin, Sophia was placed in the middle of the group.

Twenty intense pairs of eyes bore down on her from behind seemingly hollow helmets. Worse still, was that with the snow and the small radius of motion given her, she could see nothing beyond white and more white. No monsters approached them; nothing at all appeared before them in this barren whiteland. That metallic gray which Sophia so sought did not gleam in her increasingly desperate search; or if it did, it was lost in the flurry of slanting snow.

In no time at all, it seemed, gates rose before the company, and a man at the gates welcomed them to the mining town of Kirlsa.

There was no chance to explore the town. The soldiers retained a strict guard, and all Sophia could see of the town's people were a handful who had wandered over to watch them. Shabby houses framed those handful from behind. The air was heavy with the tang of metal and smoggy with its leaden perfume.

Of the thirty soldiers, twenty-six left for the Kirlsa Training Facility. The remaining four led Sophia to the grocery store, where, after Sophia presented her a list and a basket of bread and sausage courtesy of Mae, a sweet old lady oversaw seven crates of food loaded onto a groaning cart.

"I managed to retain this cart for my creaking bones," the woman told Sophia in jovial tones. "Please, tell Mae to return it to me when she's done."

It was almost noon when Sophia and the small group of soldiers exited the town, cart in tow. The lady's weary horse had been left behind at the store. The snow was beginning to die down. Perhaps it was that Sophia had features which appeared weak, incapable of carrying out an escape plan; perhaps the soldiers were eager to go home to an afternoon without their captain ruthlessly spurring them to spar. Whatever the case, the soldiers said nothing when Sophia followed the soldiers and cart from behind rather than reclaiming her position in the middle.

It was interesting, seeing the mountains without snow obscuring her view. She could have termed it picturesque, with the austere cliffs escalating to her right and plunging to her left.

What was more interesting, was the glint of metal peeking from a mound of snow, right before the next bend. Each of the soldier's helmets were turned towards the castle; none slanted a look at the ragtag girl trailing behind them. Sophia waited until they were at the mound--then stopped walking, her heart in her mouth.

The soldiers continued to cart, oblivious.

The moment the soldiers disappeared beyond the bend, Sophia darted towards the mound. Her fingers clawed at the layer of ice sealing the door to the pod, without success. She began to panic when she heard distorted shouts coming from the direction of the bend. Hardly knowing what she was doing, she pressed a hand to the ice and envisioned flames.

She had no time to marvel as the ice melted to water. She flung open the pod door, shut it with a bang, and scrambled in darkness to where she knew the seat was. Her hands crawled over each inch of surface along the seat. Failing that, she crouched to the floor and felt until her hands encountered cold metal.

Elated, Sophia grasped the object and brought it to her eyes. Even in the darkness the red button of the communicator shone a faint, inky maroon. Her fingers splayed over its surface—and one finger sunk through a gap, to feel metal on the other side. During the crash, when she was imprisoned…it must have…they must have…

The door slammed open. A flood of white light dashed against the floor. The first soldier that eclipsed the light, Sophia hurled her communicator at. She thought it fitting that the thing should mold against the soldier's armor, and not stagger him, because the world never seemed to accommodate her wishes and Sophia was beginning to accept that.

-------

Date? Second month of winter, Day 13.

Name? Sophia Esteed.

Reason for imprisonment? Attempted escape.

…and again, in sharp, precise print:

Date? Second month of winter, Day 14.

Name? Albel Nox.

Reason for imprisonment? Traitor.

-------

**AN:** Sorry about the long wait. I had to go through a lot of rewrites for this chapter. The chapters after this, though, are where the fic stops paralleling the game, except for a couple scenes later on. I'm going to try to keep AN's at the end of the chapter from now on. Don't want to clutter up the beginning. So yeah. This chapter burned me out, lol. I can't guarantee another update any time soon, sorry. Going to be busy during the summer…

Hope you enjoyed the chapter. Thanks so much for all the detailed reviews thus far. And sorry that I haven't responded to many of them… Honestly, my writing style isn't all that impressive. Since writing this story, I realize that my narrating skill desperately needs improvement. But I'm fine with that too, because I like writing and improving myself.

(6/12/07)


	6. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** In no way do Star Ocean 3 and its characters belong to me, nor do I make any profit from writing this story.

AN: I'm sorry it's been so long. I won't even attempt to justify my hiatus. I hope you enjoy the chapter.

**Cast-Iron Dreams**

**Chapter 5**

She awoke, and suddenly there was awareness. Not the hard jolt of revelation, but the cynical, quieter grip of realization, bitter and aching both at once.

She was in prison. In for a crime.

Since when had it become a crime to hope?

Her dream had been tinged with the softer details of her last enactment. Outside the pod she had felt, once more, the mild sunlight creeping with chill sweetness into her skin. She could feel the warmth deserting her as she entered and cold metal encased her; she could almost see the wispy tendrils detaching from her body like steam in black air.

Her hands had reenacted the search for the communicator. Fingers scrabbled in darkness like spider legs without a body: a mockery of swift desperation.

The communicator, next. Coveted by those spider legs, caressed with a mutant thumb. The thumb slid through the metal's gash as easily as if it had been tailored to fit through ruin.

Softer details. Her dream had kindly censored what the gash had meant; she had thought nothing of it when something sharp prodded her back and she looked down her front to see a sword impaling her chest. She turned her head to see a blur of blue and green and she smiled.

"Silly, that doesn't hurt at all," she chided affectionately. "I'm glad you're here though. I was looking for you."

The blue became the backdrop for the green as the green bled to a metallic silver like the pod's. Evacuate, an alarm had shrieked at her, but no, her feet were rooted, her lips were frozen, as green bled to silver and silver vanished high into blue. Don't leave me behind, was the scream her opened mouth had preserved in ice. The sword was still inside her, but her eyes were too fixed on the blue for a glimpse of green to notice. And all while the mild sunlight had seeped sweetly in and out her skin, too benevolent to melt the ice. Footsteps--the very ones which had froze her lips--approached her, but it was then that Sophia awoke in prison for her crime.

She was in a different cell from last time. The hacking coughs and guttering torches, heard clearly in the other, more open cell, was muffled. So, too, had the torchlight through the iron bars become concentrated instead of diffused. She looked and there was a door to her left, a heavy oaken door in which a single square was carved. It was against this solid wood that sound impacted but mutilated halfway through; the square through which torchlight threw a vivid patch, broken only by the shadows of iron bars, on the floor. She did not bother to get up to try the door.

Sophia believed in hope. She _believed_ in it. She gripped hope's silvery robes as a child might a stranger's frayed coat, pleading with snow-lashed eyes to please take her chilled hand and guide her towards home. There was nothing tainted about hope that Sophia could see. So long as one pleaded long enough, believed hard enough, there was no such thing as bitter disappointment, no such thing as betrayal brought about by one's own making.

So Sophia closed her eyes patiently and breathed out quietly, hoping for a miracle, hoping because to not hope would have meant wondering if people in the Middle Ages burned women at the stake for telling the truth: that they were not witches capable of conjuring fire.

As Sophia longed for a hearth to warm her hands, it was with a cold horror that she realized, upon opening her eyes, what wavered in the palm of her hand was fire.

-----

He had lost his father to fire.

The moment his father died had been anything but dramatic. The shrieking, a sixteenth note sharp without an echo, cut the silence with the finality of a blade. It was an accordion's compression, the dissonant sound of glass fragmenting, the raw agony of realization that flesh was being burned alive and life was charcoaling away. It was his father who shrieked and Albel who cried.

The boy told himself during the funeral, when he watched the hard ebony casket being swallowed by an earth which had no appetite, when he gripped his charcoaled arm and used pain to silence the tears, that the world held no room for weaklings. Those who cried were weaklings.

Those, too, who were killed were weaklings. Albel swallowed hard and wished he'd had his katana to grip.

It had never used to be about survival. When Albel was permitted to wield, for the first time in his life, a sword made not of wood but of real metal, his first cry on the training grounds had been: "Father!" It was a cry in which heady joy had clashed with the heavy sounds of metal scraping and men grunting their exhaustion. Back then, Albel Nox had had little luck with winning matches. His opponents would capitalize on the moment the boy turned his head to search the castle battlements.

His father never could understand why Albel would laugh, when a blunt blow later flattened his tiny form against the snow. Sprawled on the snow, hands splayed flat over his footprints, the boy seemed almost as if he were carelessly hiding something. Albel had not been called the best swordsman in the land back then.

As a boy disarmed of the power to mock and the capacity to destroy, Albel had loved his father's rage.

"Look at this." His father had pointed at the ground one day after a particularly close match, one in which Albel had emerged just shy of victor. Glou Nox's voice was gruff, not quite yelling. "Point out your footprints, Albel."

Albel did so.

Careless, intricate footwork imprinted the telltale snow. Each footprint aimed unswervingly towards the footprints from the opponent's soles. Yet whereas the opponent's imprints had sunk in deep and churned a mound of snow around their grooves, Albel's imprints were shallow, without a heel, as if the owner had moved and struck with deliberate laziness.

"Should I be ashamed?" The boy's tone was insolent, too innocent; his eyes, as his father's brow darkened, were wickedly delighted.

"Of course you should you be, you fool of a son! Look at this! Look at--" Military lips relaxed into a scowl. Fire in disciplined eyes. Swipe-and-halt gestures jerking plated arms; subconscious pacing lightning-quick. He saw it. He saw it all. All the things that spilled over Albel soaked in. He had to stop himself before he quivered.

Glou Nox abruptly halted in his pacing. The commander's sword raked the snow, split a faint imprint in half. His eyes were bright, the color of flickering fire. "Demonstrate your chicken dancing again, Albel."

Something gave his son pause. "With you?"

"Against me. Pick up your weapon, soldier."

In an instant Albel discarded his innocent expression. The boy grabbed his metal sword and flung away his insolence. His fierce grin seemed on the verge of spilling into laughter, laughter full and exulting.

He had been anticipating this, Glou Nox thought suddenly. The father glanced down sharply at the imprint-laden snow. It dawned.

A template. Just for him.

Memories buried out of shame surfaced in an instant's shock of clarity. One memory stood out, wondrous in its new light. Glou remembered, once, seeing Albel stumble during a match. His son's eyes had gone white; a look of seemingly utter revulsion had twisted his lips; he had lunged, then, and it was the closest his Albel had ever come to winning. But it was during the middle of the second lunge Glou turned to address Vox; and when he looked back, his son's flattened form had trumpeted his loss. Humiliation had discretely hid the sight from Glou's mind.

But now, now he could see it, marked so many hundreds of times the snow could not erase it.

Not a plea for forgiveness or a plea for his eye. What lay in the snow, crafted with failures, was this, only this: the offering of a steadfast promise.

_I can become better. Just show me how._

Fierce pride stamped itself across Glou Nox's eyes.

Laughter finally spilled from Albel's lips.

"So…spoils?"

"My katana."

"You have two."

"Your choice. The other will be yours by my death."

Albel was amused, the amusement of gazing at the impossible.

"What do you have to offer me, son?"

"Did I not make it clear, old man?"

His father laughed suddenly, and it was a sound Albel absorbed with the sharpest of pleasures.

"All right. Show me your chicken scratch."

-----

At thirteen Albel received his first katana while sprawled on the snow, breathless from exhaustion and from laughter full enough to stream tears.

It had not been about survival then. It had been simpler, sweeter, a game of matching his footsteps to a man whose feet were twice bigger. His life then had had more purpose to it than murder.

Later, at seventeen, Albel received his second katana from the charred remains of his father's sword hand. He had loosened it himself, watching as fingers which had once gripped his shoulders dropped as brittle ashes to the floor.

Two katanas, one death. Before and after.

He dropped the second katana with the girl, the stranger without a faction.

No flame. No casket, no toothless earth with dyspepsia. Only white, siphoning white, soft and numbing white. A frozen heaven.

Where acid--regret--should have burned, there was only the opaque emptiness of indifference.

-----

The slab of oak shuddered open; the fire in her hand winked out. For one moment her eyes were motionless as the single patch of light on the floor exploded into a strip of fiery yellow. It was as if a hunched body had risen to its full height and thrown its arms wide, loosening a cry so exultant the very echoes crashed like a waterfall upon the listener's heart. Iron bars did not exist within this vivid pool of light: the cell's exit was thrown back, thrown wide.

A shadow dammed the pure plane of light.

Sophia could not explain away the sensation of plummeting, of hurtling back-first through static sky, as light, shuddered to a halt, spilled over the shadow's back. The dull silver of metal gleamed, and then the shadow was prodded towards the wall directly opposite her, defining itself the further its back drew away from the flood of light. In a moment she recognized its features.

A guard unlocked the shadow's chains, snapped on the cast-iron ones embedded in the wall. The guard afforded her one incurious glance before he left the way he came, slamming the oak slab back in place.

All this done without a word. She did not know if the shadow saw her where she sat, back pressed solidly against the unlit wall.

In the minimalist of movements, she drew breath and arms hard around her knees. The image of a glowing hearth again seized her mind; she dared not give the desire voice. She would have preferred complete darkness to the yellow light rimming the shadows before her. At least then she would not be seen.

With the rattle of chains, the hope of invisibility dropped away.

She saw the shadow's bangs shake, its eyes gradually lift as they wandered the stones between its feet and hers. She saw it start, freeze. She could only make out the sudden compression of thin lips, the piercing gleam of red eyes as they lit on her huddled form. The rest was shadowed by the lack of light, their distance.

With the acute feeling of a forced observer, she watched as her body rose and wandered--mechanically, incautiously--on an unlit path towards the shadow before her. Her footsteps stirred quiet echoes; they seemed to resound in time with the calm beat of her unsettled heart. In five beats the shadow ceased to be and in its place was a man silent and chained.

She stood before him, her wrists bound with ropes, his arms weighted with chains. The iron cuffs set low in the wall forced his body to stoop, leveling his eyes with hers. Her clothes were soaked with melted snow; his, slashed, as if by a sword.

All Sophia could think of was her miracle.

This man would know what to do. He had once pressed a sword to her neck; he could just as easily take that sword and save her. What did it matter that she did not know this man and he did not know her? Was he not human like her? Did he not suffer now as she did? Harsh breaths fluted through Albel's curled lips. Did he not read the whisper of Hope on her lips? Her mute, inelegant face? There was nothing beautiful about her expression, she knew. Her eyelids verged on collapsing, and her mouth she could not force into a smile no matter how hard she tried.

But she had hope. She had hope. Could he not see that?

She shut her eyes when spit, warm and frothy, splattered across her cheek.

And quietly, like a scream painted in dusky blue, she broke.

How did one traverse the space between planets? How did one detach her feet from gravity and hurl herself through space, the span of absolute nothingness, a medium more barren than air?

Sophia was no engineer. She could not fashion blueprints in her mind as Fayt could: her blueprints were the gossamer webs of dreams. She could no more thread a spaceship in reality than she could explain what made up her dreams, the raw feelings that sustained them. Sophia wanted to lead a good life, happy with herself, happy with what she did. That was all. She never saw how copper and wires and spaceships fit into that picture, and so she had never bothered to learn the mechanics of flight. What did she care for other planets? She was content on earth, her portion on earth, designated by parents and a best friend who embraced her without a word.

Yet here she was.

Here she was.

Her hands rose to cover her face as his name ripped from her throat.

-----

Something she would always wonder, later, with a divided sort of smile, was this: if her spells had the all-powerful ability to conjure images from her imagination, why, then, at that moment, could she not conjure her best friend? Was the incantation found to be lacking? Should she have called out louder, shouted out stronger, given full justice to the vivid image of Fayt handing her an imaginary staff in a room full of monsters? Saying with his toothy grin, We'll make it through, you and me. Just watch us.

Silly Fayt. Always placing full trust in her when she didn't even know the rules of the game. Such confidence made her happy, in a way she knew could not last even if it would be remembered.

Why could she not conjure Fayt? The answer was simple.

Fayt was still alive. And her spells could not conjure what was not dead.

-----

"He can't hear you, you know," a dry voice said.

Something was broken. Lost. Before the thought solidified in her mind Sophia's hands had left her face. The spit, by now cool, lay streaked from her left cheekbone to her lower jaw. A streak of the same appearance was applied on Albel's right cheek.

"Take your filthy hand off me!" snarled Albel as Sophia drew back her palm. Something almost fierce--not quite a smirk but close--touched her face. It was gone as soon as it came.

As Sophia stared down at her hand, at the spit and tears that mingled both at once on the skin of her palm, the imprisoned man began to laugh. Slowly. Richly. "You've gone mad."

She did not allow herself to think twice. The image flashed once in her mind and she allowed her tongue free reign: "I can free you."

His eyes dared her to continue.

"I can find a way to break us both out."

Albel took in her ropes and laughed.

"I'm serious. I know," hesitation sapped some of the fire from her voice, "I know how to use magic. You saw it, once, when I healed you. Remember?"

He would not acknowledge the question. "Why free me? What happy fate have you to gain, maggot?"

"I need your help. Help me look for someone." Unable to swallow the word down, Sophia added, "Please."

"What makes you think I will?"

Breathing deep to expel the fear that twisted inside all at once, Sophia met Albel's eyes head on and said, "You sat at the king's table. A guard locked you in here. If you went missing your king would know. What does that say about your situation?"

"Bravo, maggot." He would have clapped if he could. "Anyone could piece together my situation but you still haven't answered the question. What makes you think I won't slit your throat once you set me free?" Albel's metal claws clicked slow, one at a time.

"I'll burn you."

Something in his eyes stilled. "With what? Dragon's breath?"

Sophia took one hair from her head and pictured the tip on fire. She moved the hair beside his right cheek, where the yellow-orange light glowed along his streak of spit.

Albel laughed. "That's it? You couldn't kill a rat with this."

The hair was incinerated. The flickering ends of the flame flattened into scales; the center roared up until its length coiled into a snake. It was at the head of the dragon, where a fiery jaw was hinged loose, that the air stirred and the beginnings of an explosion could be seen.

"Claws," murmured Albel with a smile.

"What?"

"It's missing claws."

Unable to formulate a response, Sophia let the dragon disappear from her mind.

With the light from her flame now extinguished, darkness once more softened the edges of the world. Drained from sustaining the dragon in her mind, Sophia's eyesight blurred, reeled, until finally her eyelids slid shut. Before Sophia fell she balanced on her heels, so that the weight of her body tipped her towards the ground rather than onto Albel.

Body molded against the stones, exhaustion finally blanketed all aches, told her mind to hush. For once, Sophia did not want to dream, only to sleep. Tomorrow she would need her energy to find a way out of this boxed cell of madness and clarity.

"You still haven't answered my question."

"Who is this worm to you?"

"Someone close."

"A lover," he scoffed.

Firmly, "My best friend. Will you help?"

"Free me first."

"No. Your word first. Promise me."

"You're so naïve, wench."

"Promise."

Albel was silent for so long she thought he had fallen asleep.

Then she heard it: a murmur that mixed with the sharp, soft sound of metal claws clicking one against the other. She could not see the smile that curled one corner of his lips.

"I promise, witch, to hunt out this Fayt for you."

If she could find Fayt, if she could just see him, feel his hands gripping her shoulders, shaking her, urging her to keep moving when all her muscles screamed _No!_, perhaps she could feel whole again. Strong. As if she were capable of anything, even when the rules of this world were unknown to her.

Sophia smiled. Until then, this Albel would be her miracle, whether he liked it or no.

-------

**AN**: Have you ever written something and reread it a year later, then realized all of a sudden you've lived what you wrote without ever realizing it? It's a rather eerie and disturbing feeling, haha. I can't explain it. Anyways, hope you've enjoyed the chapter. No promises on when the next'll be out, but I do promise I will finish this story someday. Thanks for reading. :)

(3/1/09)


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